


Trick or Treat

by PyrrhaIphis



Series: Holiday Fics [3]
Category: Velvet Goldmine
Genre: Gen, Halloween, Implied/Referenced Incest, The infamous foul mouth of Curt Wild
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-23 20:46:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12516220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PyrrhaIphis/pseuds/PyrrhaIphis
Summary: After serving part of his sentence for drug-related offenses, Curt Wild has been cut a very special deal that requires him to perform various acts of public service.  One of these public services involves handing out candy to children on Halloween.  Trapped in a setting where he can't menace, escape, or even swear at all the annoying people coming at him, Curt feels like he's still in jail.  (For good reason!)  Set in 1981,  btw.(Yes, the M rating is just for language.  Outside of the swearing (much of which is only in the narration this time), the content would only require a T.)





	Trick or Treat

**Author's Note:**

> As I wanted to get this up in time for Halloween (and didn't get the idea until rather late in October), I haven't spent as long letting this lie idle before the editing process, so a lot more may have slipped past me than usual. If you spot any horrible gaffes, I apologize for them. Also, please let me know so I can fix them. ;)
> 
> Some of the tangents within the conversations feel a little forced to me, so I may revisit this when I have time to try and fix them up. (But that--if it even happens--won't be until sometime next year. And it might not happen at all.)

            “ _Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat!_ ”

            Under normal circumstances, that sing-song chant would probably have had Curt hurling rotten eggs at the little brats.

            But these _weren’t_ normal circumstances.  And even if he was free to act on his usual anti-social impulses, he was under the watchful gaze of a bunch of mistrustful parents, not to mention a buttload of cops, a parole officer, a political handler, and half a dozen other stiff-shirts whose function Curt couldn’t even begin to guess.

            So he did the only thing he could:  he smiled at the irritating little tykes, and dumped some candy in their cheap plastic pails.

            They cheered, and scampered off to the next cell.

            Whoever decided on this event was sick in the head.

            “That’s lame!” a kid suddenly shouted, giving Curt a disappointed look.  The boy was probably eight or nine—maybe even a really short ten or eleven—dressed up as Batman, and had his arms crossed petulantly, his pillowcase of candy clutched in one hand.  “Why aren’t you in costume?”

            “I _am_ in costume,” Curt insisted.

            “What are you, then?  The ghost of the ‘70s?”

            If Curt could have reached the brat, he might have tried to strangle him.  Were his stage clothes really _that_ dated?  The ‘70s had only been over for a year and a half!  “I’m a werewolf,” Curt said, trying not to snarl.  Though in this case, snarling might have helped.

            “You don’t _look_ like a werewolf.”

            “That’s ‘cause there isn’t a full moon out.”

            The kid laughed.  “You’re a dork,” he said, shaking his head.  “But I guess you can give me candy anyway.”  The boy held out his pillowcase towards the cell bars.

            “You little—” Curt started, but he bit back the retort instantly when he saw his parole officer lean closer with a menacing look on his face.  Instead, Curt bared his teeth as he tossed some candy into the proffered sack.  “Better watch your back after moon-up,” Curt added, following his words up with a howl.

            The boy shook his head, and wandered off towards the next cell.  But the older boy—fifteen or sixteen, wearing a Michael Jackson T-shirt—who had been standing behind him stayed where he was.  “What is this shit?” he asked.

            Curt shrugged.  “Public service?”  That was what the judge had called it, right?  No, no, it was _community_ service.  Well, close enough.

            “So, what, you get outta jail with a slap on the wrist, and turn into Mr. Clean, ready to tell all the kids not to do drugs?”

            So this kid recognized Curt.  “Didn’t know I had any fans your age,” he sighed.

            “You don’t _now_.”

            Okay, that just fucking _hurt_.  “C’mon, anyone would do this in my position.”

            “Who the fuck would want to stand around in a phony cell all day, handing out candy to a bunch of brats?”

            Given the lectures Curt had been given about not swearing at this event—due to the presence of countless children—he was a little surprised no one reacted to the boy using the word Curt was absolutely most forbidden to utter while within these walls.  “Hey, I was given the choice of doing some public service announcements and general garbage like this, or staying in jail another two years, minimum.  You telling me _you_ wouldn’t take that choice?”

            The boy grimaced, and looked down at his feet.  “ _I_ wouldn’t be given that choice, honky.”

            Curt sighed.  “No, probably not,” he agreed.  “I wouldn’t have been given it either, if I wasn’t famous.  Got nothing to do with the color of my skin.”

            “Bullshit.”

            As much as he wanted to argue, Curt couldn’t.  He _hoped_ a black star would have been cut the same deal, but he couldn’t be sure.

            “Well?” the boy asked after a moment or two of silence.  “Not gonna go into a ‘drugs are bad’ speech for me?”

            “Kid, if you know who I am, you already know what drugs did to me, so I don’t see what point there would be in a speech about it.”  Not that he had memorized any of the speeches they had given him on the subject, anyway.  Curt preferred to speak from the heart.  Or at least to say words that more or less agreed with his heart.  He wasn’t gonna spout that bullshit.  If he was going to preach against drug use, he was gonna tell the truth about what it had been like, trying to claw his way out from under his heroin addiction.  Not as pretty, but that was exactly why it would be more effective.

            The boy looked at him warily.  “And?”

            “And what?”

            “You telling me these mofos _only_ asked you to keep kids off drugs?”  The boy gestured at the suited men behind him as he spoke.

            Curt grimaced.  “I’m not about to tell people how to live their lives.  I’ll go into horrific detail about what it feels like suffering from heroin withdrawals, if you wanna know what you can save yourself from, but that’s it.  I’m not gonna tell you to avoid drugs, if you’re dumb enough to take ‘em after you know what they’ll do to you, I’m not gonna tell you to stop smoking—”  The kid let out a cry of complaint, but there was no mistaking the smell clinging to him.  Curt had gotten very sensitive to that smell since he’d started trying to quit smoking.  Though he was pretty sure cigarettes were an addiction that was going to win…  “—and I’m not gonna tell you who you should and shouldn’t date.”  He grinned, despite the hard looks the suits were giving him.  “In my experience, you should play the _whole_ field before deciding on a position.”

            The kid shook his head.  “Some of us don’t have the option,” he muttered.

            “Yeah, you do.  No one has the right to—”

            “You don’t know what my old man’s like!” the boy snapped.  “If he thought I—”  He stopped abruptly, clamping his mouth shut.

            “My old man sent me to electric shock treatments for a year and a half,” Curt told him.  “And when that didn’t work, he beat the shi—stuffing out of me until I finally took off.  Believe me, I know.”

            “Thought you were raised by wolves.”

            “I wish.”

            That made the boy laugh, and left him with a genuine smile.  He was a good-looking kid; if Curt was ten years younger, or the boy at least six or seven years older…

            Another crowd of little kids came rampaging up, driving the teenager away with their demands for candy.  The parents accompanying them watched Curt carefully as he passed the candy out through the bars of the cell, as if they expected him to pass right through them to molest their children.  When the children and their parents went away again, a man remained, standing in between Curt and the suits against the wall.

            The man was about five or ten years older than Curt, on the homely side of non-descript, and carrying a notepad in one hand and a pen in the other.  A reporter.  That was just fucking great.  As if this wasn’t humiliating enough already?

            “No costume?” the man asked, walking up to the bars.

            “Bite me.”  Being nice to the kids was one thing.  Being nice to the press was something else entirely.

            The reporter laughed.  “You’re a vampire, then?  Isn’t it _your_ job to do the biting?”

            “You’re not my type,” Curt answered, trying not to laugh.

            That made the other man blanch.  “Maybe you don’t understand,” he said, with an uncomfortable cough.  “I’m a reporter.  Lionel Hodge, from the _Herald_.”

            “Don’t care.”  Curt’s reply made his parole officer clear his throat pointedly.  Being nice to the press must have been part of the deal after all, only no one had bothered to tell Curt about it.  Of course.  Because why would _he_ need to know?  He was just the monkey in the cage.  Wolf in the pen.  Whatever the fuck he was right now.

            Lionel—of all the stupid names—shook his head.  “Guess this is why the new kid didn’t want to come.”

            “What?”

            “He must have known you like to bite the heads off reporters.”  He chuckled.  “He did sound downright _scared_.”

            “Who wouldn’t be scared at the idea of being surrounded by this many candy-crazed kids?” Curt retorted.  He didn’t like thinking that covering his ridiculous publicity stunt/community service duty/dumbass punishment would have been enough to scare someone.

            Lionel shrugged.  “That was what he _claimed_ , but you should have heard him!  ‘No bleedin’ way am I goin’ to interview ‘im wif all those bloody urchins about—and nofink you can say will change me mind!’”  Lionel let out a mean-spirited laugh upon the conclusion of his overstated imitation.

            “Just where is this guy from?”  The accent the reporter had produced was more than a little fucked up.

            “London, far as I know.  Got pissed off when I called him Cockney, though.”

            “Yeah, that didn’t sound Cockney to me.”  Curt shook his head.  “Doesn’t he ever talk about his home at all?”  Trying to guess where this guy’s coworker was from had to be more rewarding than allowing himself to be interviewed about this dumb ‘Trick or Treat at the Station’ shit.

            “Doesn’t talk about much at all.  Just gets weird whenever anyone turns on a radio.”

            “Uh…”  What was Curt supposed to say to _that_?  Without a few details, it didn’t tell him a damn thing.  And even with details, it wouldn’t say where the guy was from.  “What about sports?” Curt suggested.  If there was one way an Englishman was likely to let his hometown slip, it was in reacting to the latest ‘football’ scores.  “He ever talk about sports?”

            “Not in a way that makes sense.”  Lionel chuckled.  “Murray and I were arguing about what the best football team was, and when we asked Arthur for his vote, he gave us an…I don’t even know what—labor union or something!”

            “Labor union?”  Curt was trying to imagine the letters AFL-CIO on a football jersey, but it wasn’t really working…

            “Man, United.  Gotta be a union; it’s right there in the title.”

            Curt laughed.  “They’re a pretty good team,” he assured the reporter.  “Brian got really pissed at me once for saying so.  Thought that meant I was ‘supporting’ them.  Like I care about soccer teams.”  Curt shook his head.  “So your co-worker is probably from Manchester.  Or maybe not; they have a lot of fans who aren’t local.  Still…Manchester…”  Curt let out a sigh, feeling a sweet memory washing over him.

            “Nice place?” Lionel suggested.

            “Enh, you seen one city, you seen ‘em all.”  Curt’s laugh was warm and gentle, the kind of laugh he would never have let out while he was really in jail.  “But I knew a kid from Manchester once.  Now, _he_ was nice…”

            “Yeah?  What was his name?”

            Curt shrugged.  “Don’t remember.  Not sure he ever told me.”

            “Can’t have known him too well, then!” Lionel laughed.

            “Only in the Biblical sense.”

            The other man’s laughter died out in a coughed squeak.  “This…was a… _kid_ …?”

            “Teenager.  Probably eighteen, maybe nineteen.  Real quiet.  But god, was he cute…”

            “When was this?”  Lionel was looking at Curt suspiciously now, like he was preparing to write a scathing article accusing Curt of pedophilia.

            “February of ’75,” Curt told him.  “In London.”

            Lionel’s suspicious look turned crestfallen.  Yeah, not so much story _that_ way, was there?  Maybe none at all.  “But you were still—” he started, but he didn’t get any further than that before the publicity man’s hand was on his shoulder.

            “There’s much more to see in this event,” he said, giving Lionel a sickening, shark-like smile when the man turned to look at him.  “Let me show you how much the children are enjoying it, so you can share that with your readers.”

            “Hey, I’m a serious journalist!” Lionel objected.  “You can’t treat me like a cub reporter.  I’ll have you know I’ve covered all kinds of scandals, and I know a story when I smell one!  I was one of the first ones to break the Am-Scam story, and when I wrote about Watergate, I—”

            “Of course,” the suit said, in an oozingly patronizing way, without letting go of the other man for a moment, practically dragging him away from Curt’s cell.

            After the reporter was led away, Curt was given just enough silence to start wishing he had a cigarette before he heard the commotion from the next cell over.  “That’s a sweet costume, baby,” a lecherous voice was saying, “but where have your children got to?  Want me to come out and help you look for them?”

            “I don’t have any,” a familiar voice replied.

            “All the more reason for me to come out,” the man replied, just as a figure dressed as a Victorian chimney sweep came around the corner.  A hand emerged from the cell, covered in fake pustules and gore.

            “You should have that looked at,” Mandy laughed, looking down at the fake wounds.  Then she strolled over to Curt’s cell and promptly burst into mocking laughter.  “Is that all you could think of to wear?!” she exclaimed.

            “Don’t say that when you’re dressed like a damned chimney sweep,” Curt grumbled.

            “I’m a paperboy,” Mandy insisted, turning to show him the bag of rolled paper she was carrying over her shoulder.

            Curt shrugged, then gave her costume a more critical look.  Knickerbockers with suspenders, a grimy button-up shirt, a little cap to hide most of her hair…it really did make her look quite fetchingly boyish.  “You actually look pretty hot as a boy,” Curt said, with an uncomfortable cough.

            “That…please don’t say things like that.  It’s fucking creepy.”

            Curt sighed.  “How come you get to swear and I don’t?”

            “Because I’m not the one in the cell?” Mandy suggested, with a lilting laugh.  “What _are_ you doing in there, anyway?”

            With a grimace, Curt explained about the deal he’d been given.  “That creep in the next cell who was hitting on you?” he added, in a whisper.

            “The zombie?”

            Curt nodded.  “He’s a cop.”

            Mandy shuddered.  “That’s much more frightening than his make-up.”

            “About half the ‘monsters’ in the cells are cops.  The rest are mostly rich people with too much time on their hands who think kids’ll actually enjoy having jailed monsters give them candy.”  And then there were the unwilling ex-cons like Curt…though he was probably the sole example of his type, now that he thought about it…

            “Are the kids actually enjoying this?”

            “Beats me.  They mostly don’t seem to care.”  Curt bit his lip a moment.  “Hey, is there anyone around?” he asked.

            Mandy looked up and down the hall.  “No kids or parents.  Just…those guys behind me…”

            “Okay.”  How was he going to say this?  Other than quietly.  He couldn’t have those suits—or the cops in the cells next to his—hearing it.  “Just…look…tell me what happened,” Curt begged.  “I got outta jail only to find out that…what’s going _on_?  Why would Brian…”

            Mandy looked a bit like someone had slapped her.  “I don’t know,” she admitted.  “I tried to speak to him, but wasn’t allowed to.”  She sighed sadly.  “Shannon said he didn’t want to see me.  I don’t know if it’s true or not.”

            “I asked around about…”  Curt stopped, drawing a few deep breaths, trying to right his thoughts.  “Everyone said he had campaigned for Reynolds.”

            Mandy nodded.  “His first album came out not long after you were locked up, and it was an overnight success.”  That was how it had always been for Brian.  “As soon as Reynolds got the nomination, Bri—To— _he_ started making public appearances with him.  I don’t know why.  Reynolds is everything we used to hate.”

            “So is the music.”

            “That, too.”

            Curt sighed.  As soon as his parole officer had found out he had been asking questions about ‘Tommy Stone,’ he had been informed that if he didn’t stop immediately, he’d be right back in jail, with no hope of further parole, or maybe even _release_.  “We should talk about this later,” he said quietly, hearing some kid screaming a few cells down.

            Mandy nodded.  “Give me a call when you get out,” she said, with a slightly mocking laugh.

            The screaming kid—now merely crying—was carried around the corner before Curt could rebut Mandy’s usual mockery.  The child was a girl about two or three years old, dressed like a fairy princess—wings, a cheap tiara and a long, dewy dress—and she was wailing in the arms of her father, who seemed to be dressed as a donkey.

            “Hey, what’s wrong?” Curt asked, as gently as he could.  The little girl didn’t stop crying, or even seem to hear him.

            “Our little fairy queen here doesn’t much like zombies and things, it turns out,” the father said, his voice echoing eerily in his donkey head.

            “Let me—” Curt started, trying to open the door, having forgotten—again!—that he was actually locked in.  “Hey, lemme out a minute,” he said, looking at the cops across from him.

            The cops all looked at his parole officer, who shrugged, and nodded.  “Should be fine.”

            The fact that they had wanted _permission_ to let him out—as if he was _really_ still a prisoner—was eating at Curt the whole time the cop was unlocking the cell.  Who did these motherfuckers think they were?  He was doing this as a charity gig, not as a punishment!

            Once the cell was open, Curt stepped out and went over to the crying child, stroking her hair a bit to get her attention.  When she looked at him, he started singing a sweet old lullaby about dancing fairies and other saccharine things like that.  At first, the girl didn’t seem to care, but by the time the song was over, she had stopped crying, and started smiling.  She even reached out to play with Curt’s hair.  He hated it when kids did that, but did his best not to let it get to him, if only because he didn’t want to have to hear more crying.

            “You’ve got a lovely singing voice,” an unfamiliar woman’s voice said.  Glancing in her direction, Curt saw she was dressed as a pirate, complete with a real parrot on her shoulder and everything,  A boy about ten or twelve years old was standing in front of her—her hook on his shoulder—dressed like a shipwrecked waif, and looking horribly embarrassed.  “Ever thought of pursuing a career in singing?”

            Mandy started laughing so loudly that even if Curt could have come up with a proper retort to use around a three year old, no one would have heard it anyway.  The cops were soon all laughing, too.

            “What?” the woman dressed as a pirate asked.  “What’s so funny?”

            “He’s in costume as an old ‘70s rock star, mom!” the boy with her whined.

            “Which one?” the mother asked, before Curt could even snap that it wasn’t a costume.

            “I don’t know.  That gay one.”

            “You piece of—!”

            “We don’t use that kind of language, young man!” the mother-pirate snapped, swatting the boy’s head with her styrofoam hook.  “It’s offensive.”

            The boy shrugged.

            “How about a publicity photo?”  The political handler was back; must’ve dumped that reporter in the mermaid tank.  “Since you’re out of the cell anyway, and the little girl seems so taken with you.”

            Curt sighed.  But that was exactly the kind of good press that might help his career back on its feet.  And that stupid kid still hadn’t let go of his hair, so…

            The whole time Curt was posing for the publicity shot with the little girl in his arms, Mandy was whispering to the pirate and her son.  Presumably explaining to them that Curt wasn’t _dressed_ as ‘that gay ‘70s rock star,’ but that he actually _was_ him.  After the photo, Curt was escorted back into his cell by the cops, who quickly locked it again, like he was actually dangerous.  Well, he was mad enough, he probably _would_ attack the next person to piss him off.

            Then, to heap injury onto insult, Curt actually had to hand out candy to the little fairy princess and the boy with the big mouth.  “Sorry about my parents’ ignorance,” the boy said, gesturing over his shoulder at the pirate and the donkey.  “They don’t care about anything but books written by old dead guys.  Oughta be a law that two English teachers can’t have kids together.”

            “Uh…”  If Curt pointed out that the boy was the one who had really pissed him off, was he gonna be put back in jail for real?  A glance at the warning expression on his parole officer’s face said he probably would…  “Why are you letting your mom get to be the pirate and you’re just some kid?” he asked instead.

            “She insisted this was the better costume.  ‘Cause I’m Jim, the hero, and she’s Long John Silver, the bad guy.”

            “Er…that’s, uh…”  What book was that, again?

            “ _Treasure Island_ ,” the boy sighed, even though Curt hadn’t vocalized his uncertainty.  Kid had probably been getting the question all night.  “Better than a few years ago.  When mom was pregnant with this little brat, she insisted on being Falstaff, and I had to be her squire.”

            “Sounds like your mom likes Halloween more than you do.”

            “I’d like it better if she didn’t make me read all about my costume first,” the boy sighed.

            Curt laughed.  “So be a rock star next year.”

            “Yeah, like those two would let me be something that wasn’t literary.”  So saying, the boy wandered off towards the next cell, with his little sister toddling after him.  Their parents followed at a more leisurely pace, but even with their dawdling, they were soon out of earshot.

            Mandy moved closer to Curt’s cell again.  “I had no idea you were so good with kids,” she commented, sounding like she wanted to laugh again.

            Curt shrugged. “I’m not.  But I’ve been around plenty of ‘em; my sister popped out her first when she was sixteen.”

            “Jesus.  Hadn’t she ever heard of birth control?”

            “Doubt it.  They didn’t exactly teach sex ed in the crummy excuse for a school we were sent to.”

            Mandy shook her head.  “Did the father at least marry her?”

            Curt’s laugh was a bit more mean-spirited than he had intended.  “Never even fessed up.  Then again, it was probably illegal.”

            “Illegal?”

            “Everyone was pretty sure my brother was the father.”

            “But he wasn’t, right?”  Mandy sounded strangely hopeful.

            “Beats me.  But I know he was fu—”  Curt stopped himself with a cough as he noticed all the suits glaring at him..  “—sleeping with her,” he finished.  “It’s just a question of if he was the father or not.  Kid was messed up enough that he probably was.  But that was good for me; they didn’t want any other reminders of my brother’s sick ways, so they all looked the other way when I left, didn’t come looking for me.”  Sometimes he thought that might actually have been _why_ his father had started beating him so badly, to encourage him to run away.  Or maybe he was just trying to kill Curt, as if it was _his_ fault his brother was into incest.  Hell, maybe it _was_ his fault.  Who had that asshole really wanted to fuck, Curt or their sister, or both?  Which had he started fucking first?  Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

            Mandy was looking at Curt with wide, pitying eyes that made him sick to his stomach.  “Aren’t there laws to protect people…?”

            “So long as the white trash stayed _in_ the trailer park, the cops didn’t bother with us unless we were shooting each other, and even then they resented it.”  Curt shook his head.  “My sister did eventually get out and move to Detroit,” he added, trying to make Mandy’s pity-beams turn off.  “At twenty-one, with four kids to look after.”  Each kid with a different father, most likely.  And, of course, she hadn’t so much left as been kicked out, because the last father hadn’t been _white_ trash.  Maybe hadn’t been trash at all.  “I was in New York by then, but I’ve been back to check in on her plenty of times.  She finally got married after the seventh kid…or was it the eighth?”

            “Fuck…”  Mandy grimaced.  “I’m so glad I never got pregnant.”

            “Did Brian want kids?”  Curt couldn’t quite imagine it…

            She shrugged.  “Never said anything about it.  Brian was never the type to plan for the future.”

            “Guess not,” Curt said, even though it was a lie.

            Mandy glanced back the way she had come.  “Sounds like more kids are coming.  I think I’ll go before they get here.  Hang in there!  And give me a call after this is over.  You’ve got my number, right?”

            “Yeah.”

            Mandy gripped his hand comfortingly through the bars, and headed along the hall towards the other end of the event, ignoring the wolf whistles from a few of the jailed cops further down.

            The whole time the new parade of hollering, costumed brats came streaming past his cell demanding candy, Curt’s mind went whirling through his memories of the glory year of 1973, the height and beauty of the love that had passed between him and Brian.  They had spent so many late nights talking in a warm, contented post-sex haze, passing a joint back and forth between them as they discussed their plans for the future.

            They were already liberating the youth of the world by showing off how perfect, glamorous and happy they were to pass their love back and forth between men and women both.  And once the teens were all in their camp, together the two of them and their teenage hordes would enlighten the older generations, their older siblings first, then their parents and grandparents, until the whole world was ready to fuck everyone.  And then…then there’d be no more war, because the whole world was gonna elect Brian as the beautiful new King, and everything would be aesthetic and perfect, nothing but sex, drugs and rock’n’roll.

            Okay, maybe it had just been the marijuana talking.

            But they had spent sober hours, too, talking about winning over the whole world, making a difference that would last.  Putting an end to the shit Curt had gone through in the trailer park.  Stopping the mindless judgmentalism of Brian’s middle class parents and their outdated moralism.

            How had that gone so wrong?

            Brian _couldn’t_ have just said he wanted those things because Curt wanted them.  It was impossible.

            So how did he end up turning into a conservative politician’s personal rock star?  Just because he had lost his looks?  It seemed inconceivable.

            Curt couldn’t even ask him about it.  Seemed like Brian’s new persona didn’t just have the hearts of countless kids without the sense to know shit when they heard it; he also had the protection of the new administration.  And Curt was already vulnerable, being a barely released ex-con.  It would take him a long time to prove to the world—and especially to the cynical minds of managers and record labels—that he was really off drugs for good this time.

            “ _Trick or treat!_ ”

            A new pack of kids had arrived in front of his cell, all wearing identical costumes:  white suits with cheap plastic masks of Tommy Stone’s face and hair.

            For the first time since he ran away from his father’s beatings, Curt was afraid.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, long notes coming now. First off, about the event Curt is being forced to take part in. I realize it sounds really crazy, but it's based on an event I actually went to once as a child. (Probably right around the same time this fic takes place, actually, since my brother has no memory of it.) The real life event was at the police station of a wealthy district, and people in monster costumes were in all the holding cells. I think it was more like a haunted house (without the jump scares) than a trick or treat thing, as such; I think we were just supposed to walk down the hall past all the "monsters" and then probably got candy at the end. Only for me it wasn't that simple, because as we were passing one of the cells, one of the "monsters" inside started calling out to me by name, scaring the living daylights out of me. Turned out she was one of my father's cousins (one I didn't know very well, so I didn't recognize her voice), but...yikes, was that traumatic.
> 
> Like many of my fics (especially the weirder ones) this was something I thought of at a time when I absolutely couldn't start writing it down. (In the middle of my commute to or from work in this case.) The conversation between Curt and Lionel was the part that I first thought of...only the way the conversation originally went in my head, it was much more smooth and natural for Arthur's hometown to be mentioned following the unfair imitation. Sadly, I never seem to capture the exact thread of conversations when I try to write them down after the fact. :( In this case, the story really suffered for my inability, especially since I had to fall back on the same labor union joke I used in an earlier fic. D:
> 
> The idea that Curt's family might be the kind of racists who wouldn't accept non-white children in their family tree came from "Raised by Wolves" by what_alchemy. It's the kind of suggestion that gets in your brain and just stays there because it makes so much sense that it's hard to see it any other way, y'know?
> 
> And for the final note--partially to explain some of the awkward turns of the story--when it came to that first kid in costume, I stopped and thought to myself "what would he be dressed up as?" Sure, there's always the classic monsters and stuff, but from what I remember of being a kid in the early '80s and from what I see in modern ads for kids' costumes, it seems like children prefer to dress up as popular characters. So, realistically, in 1981, a boy would probably go for Superman, a Star Wars character or maybe Indiana Jones. Only I don't want to refer to Star Wars because I don't want it to seem like an actor joke, and since Curt was in jail when "Raiders of the Lost Ark" came out, he might not know who Indy is, and I already mentioned Superman in an earlier fic, so I was like "well, some other famous superhero, then" and the top two to come to mind were Batman and Spiderman, but since Spiderman's face is entirely masked, I didn't like that option. Normally, I don't want to refer to Batman because I don't want it to sound like an actor joke, but since Arthur wasn't in this, I was like "yeah, why not?" And then a few lines later, I used the word "howl." Which is normally cool, but I guess I was feeling punchy, because I decided to give Arthur a presence (beyond his being directly discussed in the story) by referencing as many Christian Bale roles as I possibly could. :P But only ones I've actually seen, because trying to reference something you haven't seen is not necessarily feasible. I didn't manage to find a way to insert "Empire of the Sun," though. (Not without getting *really* tortured, anyway. And the Shakespeare references were already pretty torturous as it was.)


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